In early spring you will want to cut back your hop plant shoots but you will only want to cut back the correct ones. There are two types of shoots that will emerge from the hop plant. The first ones that come out are called "bull" shoots. These early shoots will be only a handfull, 3-5 per plant and they will have a hollow stem. You will want to scout the yard early to see when the shoots come out. Once you see some shoots emerging from the hill you will want to remove the dirt from the hill and locate the level of the 2nd set of shoots. They will be separated by inches if not more and the goal is to cut the hill between the two levels of shoots. By removing the early "Bull" shoots you are also removing any downey that may have attached to the plant during the winter. You will want to BE CAREFUL not to cut below the 2nd level of shoots, this will affect you'r yield. We recommend you remove the soil in one hill in ONE varieity, measuring the difference and then cutting above the 2nd level. Once you do one plant and identify the location where to cut, you can cut the rest with an automated tool such as a mower or weed eater. VERY IMPORTANT: This will be varieity specific so make sure you look and work per varieity becouse each one may be different and you will NOT want to cut the 2nd level of shoots by mistake.

The first largest bines to emerge on 2nd year or older hop crowns are not necessarily the best to train. These "bull" shoots have a large hollow core, like a straw; and easily kink or are damaged by late spring storms. Most crowns put out two to three of these, at the most; and crews can be trained to identify them and prune them out as they twirl climbing bines. "Bull" shoots are often a light olive green color with stretched internodes - some field practice clipping a few will reveal which have the hollow stems.

More Info. By Steve Schmidt

Using the "Bull" Shoots will lower your harvest yield due to the stretched internodes. With stretched internodes you will get less side arms, by using the 2nd shoots that come out you will have less internode spacing and that in turn increases the number of side arms and increases your harvest yield.

Crown buds can be protected in several ways as you prepare you hop yard for winter. First, leave the hop bines cut at 24 to 36 inches high over the winter. The old bines supply extra sugars to the crowns and act like little snow fences; slowing the wind, holding snow and field debris around the crowns. Second, physically cover the young crowns - protective mulches or field soil 1 to two inches deep is a typical field practice. Third, apply a high potassium fertilizer in the fall to winterize the hop plants. Hop yards with low potassium levels experience higher levels of winter crown bud damage. A close placement of granular or dissolved through the drip system is necessary for it to be effective; since the fine feeder root mat formed during the growing season is breaking down and disappearing. The potassium ion prevents ice crystals from forming in the plant tissues and allows water movement at lower temperature ranges. (Think of potassium as anti-freeze for your hops!)

Our 2013 Hop Yard Tour is being organized for the year and we are getting a great response from the local community. This year is expected to be bigger with Beer Brewing demonstrations and Free Beer tastings by Home and Micro Brewers. Please join us on August 10th from 1-5pm in Farmington, NY

Well it looks like it's time again to get ready for 2013. Here are some things you should be looking to acquire or get on the list to acquire.

Hop Yard Poles: Here are the pro's and con's for each variety.

Presure Treated Milled Poles:

Pro: Nice looking, Straight, 20+ years of life.
Con: Very expensive, around $80 to $100 per pole.

Black Locust rough cut trees:

Pro: Very hard wood with 30+ years of life.
Con: Locust competes with firewood and firewood brings more money.
Con: Cost around $40 to $60 per pole.
Con: Since logs are not striaight you can get less on a truck to haul.
Con: Not straight
Con: Limited supply in NY

Red Cedar rough cut trees:

Pro: Hard wood with 15-20+ years of life.
Pro: Straight
Con: Tree can go from 11 inch width on the bottom to 4 inch width on the top. Must be carful on which one's you select.
Con: Limited Supply in NY

Larch/Tamarack rought cut trees:

Pro/Con: Medium Hard wood sith 10-15+ years of life.
Pro/Con: Adding wood treatment to bottom can extend life by 5 or more years
Pro: Straight and keeps width of tree from top to bottom better
Pro: Price will range from $35 to $45 per pole.
Con: Must be cut during winter months
Con: Limited supply in NY

Also keep in mind that delivery can be extra and if the truck doesn't have a way to unload the logs you will need to provide tools to unload.

Rhizomes: Most orders are done in the January time frame so they can be delivered in March/April for planting.

Coir: Usually ordered with Ryzones so a large enough order can be made. Usually takes a few months for cargo container to be shipped.

Harvest of the hops are done for this year. We collected about 20 pounds wet this year. Everything was sold to Custom Brewcrafters in NY and they are making a harvest ale in the next week or 2. Should be interesting to see how it comes out.

Thanks to everyone that helped this year and we will keep you posted on our next acre going in next year.

On a Saturday afternoon in August, friends and family gathered for a celebration

at the Bowerman farm in Victor. Stories were shared and laughs were had. However, there was

one problem: The keg was kicked. Luckily , that’s not too much of an obstacle when the hosts are hops farmers. “That’s what happens when you invite a bunch of hopheads out,” said Kurt Charland, a co-owner at The Bluebell Hopyard on the Bowerman’s Cline Road farm. Luckily , Charland — along with fellow owners Fred Armstrong and Rob Potter — still had plenty of beer for their “hophead”

guests to enjoy . The cause of their celebration was their newest crop — hops. A hop is a tiny cone-shaped plant used as an ingredient in beer. It’s a bitter plant that is meant to add flavor to beer and to balance out the sweetness from the malt. Hops grow upward, meaning they typically stretch vertically up a lengthy section of rope or wire. It’s no surprise that Charland, like many other fellow growers, prefers a more “hoppy ” beer, such as an Indian pale ale (IPA). The Bluebell Hopyard will eventually be able to produce plenty of IPA with its 500 hop plants that grow on Bry ce Bowerman’s Victor farm. The Bluebell trio aren’t the only ones attempting to bring back the art of hops farming to Ontario County . In fact, one of their neighbors is also getting into the beer business. Stephan Schmidt, owner of Schmidt Farm on County Road 8 in Farmington, has about 800

hops plants stretched out on an acre of his property . But despite his new crop, Schmidt isn’t the beer fanatic that you might suspect. “Actually , I don’t even drink beer,” Schmidt said. “I’m an entrepreneur, I have a lot of different businesses, and this is another one I just started.” Schmidt also owns a website-hosting business, and he has a farming background as well. Even in a region known for wine, he decided to follow a different path. “There are too many people doing grapes,” he said. “I needed to do something different, something unique.” Hopping on the bandwagon Schmidt doesn’t plan to use his hops to brew his own beer. Instead, he plans to sell his hops to microbreweries in the Rochester and Canandaigua area. He’ll also target home brewers as customers. At this early stage, it won’t be the most lucrative business, he added.

“It’s not going to be profitable for five or six y ears, but hopefully down the road it’ll be

profitable,” Schmidt said.

Schmidt explained that in the first y ear, his crop would grow about a third of the way up the

rope — which is about 15 feet high. The plants will be harvested at the end of August or

September, and next y ear they ’ll grow back taller than that initial y ear. Schmidt said in y ear two,

the plants will grow almost to the top of the rope, and by the third y ear, the hop area will

become a “wall of green.” While profits won’t peak until the growing process is well underway , expenses to start a hop farm are costly at the beginning. “On average you’re looking at investing about $12,000 per acre to get it up,” Schmidt said. “That’s your initial investment. The next y ear, you have to spray and maintain the area, take care of the weeds, things like that. Y our bigger costs will come down to y ear two or three when you have more harvest to do, because you need to buy

more equipment.” Equipment such as a harvester costs about $40,000, he added. The other option, aside from costly equipment, is to handpick the hops. Once the hops are picked, farmers can either sell them, like what Schmidt plans to do, or they can utilize them to brew their own beer. That’s the plan for the men of The Bluebell Hopyard.www.mpnnow.com/topstories/x1265468783/Brewing-up-a-revival-in-hops-in-Ontario-County 2/3 The art of hopping According to Bluebell co-owner Rob Potter, typically about six to eight ounces of hops are used in a five-gallon batch of beer. He noted that is the estimate for a more hoppy beer, like an IPA, and includes dry hopping. He explained that dry

hopping is the addition of hops after fermentation, when the beer is ready to be bottled. By contrast, wet hopping is when the hops are used immediately after they ’re picked. One plant will produce about one to two pounds of hops, Schmidt said. Aside from adding bitterness to the brew, or for dry hopping, hops can also be used to enrich the aroma, Potter said. Both Schmidt and Potter agreed it’s a good time to get into the hops business. It could be getting even better after legislation

that protects a vital tax benefit for the state’s breweries was passed earlier this summer by the state Legislature and signed by Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Specifically , the legislation states that any brewery that produces 60 million or fewer gallons of beer in New Y ork will be eligible for a refundable tax credit applied against personal income and business taxes. The credit is worth 14 cents per gallon for the first 500,000 gallons and 4.5 cents per gallon for the next 15 million gallons produced.

A history of hops In the late 1800s, the hop industry thrived in New Y ork State, said Sydney Loftus, a co-chair of the Madison County Hop Fest and the executive director of the Madison County Historical Society . Areas of central New Y ork — particularly Madison, Oneida and Otsego counties — produced 80 percent of the nation’s hops in 1880, Loftus said. Ontario County also

was a bright spot in hops farming. At Bluebell there are still hops growing on the property that were started about 150 years ago, Charland estimated. Unfortunately , the golden age of hops in New Y ork ended decades ago. Loftus said hops production was cut down by a combination of things that included, a mold called downy mildew that plagued the plants, prohibition and competition from

the Pacific Northwest. But that unfortunate bit of history is not deterring New Y ork farmers — like Schmidt and the Bluebell guy s — from try ing to revive the art form. “It’s bringing back history , which is awesome,” Charland said of the hop farming. “It’s a piece of history that’s almost been

lost, and we’re kind of bringing it back.” Festivals like the one in Madison County help raise awareness of the hop culture, Loftus added. This will be the 17th annual Madison County Hop Fest, which takes place in Oneida. The festival is scheduled for Sept. 14 to Sept. 16. Aside from having brewing demonstrations and exhibits detailing the history of the beer ingredient, the Hop

Fest will also have hop-shaped jewelry available for those who want to visibly display their love of the plant. The festival also preaches fun — something that is also a vital part of The Bluebell Hopyard and Schmidt Farm. “It has been fun, it’s not like work,” said Fred Armstrong, a co-owner at Bluebell. “It’s a partnership where we enjoy each other’s company .”